


striking light

by torchsong (riverballad)



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: 2 Year Time Skip from Loveater/Miraculous Queen, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Friends to Enemies to Lovers, Love Cube... I guess, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-21
Updated: 2019-10-21
Packaged: 2020-12-24 08:23:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21096395
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/riverballad/pseuds/torchsong
Summary: Hawkmoth disappears. Everything gets worse.





	striking light

**Author's Note:**

  * For [keytniss](https://archiveofourown.org/users/keytniss/gifts).

> Here's the [SOUNDTRACK](http://open.spotify.com/playlist/2cWiLZSxmWKVOk4EdPuBJj?si=QT1Okid5T-Gci8z2b_HrIw)

In Hawkmoth’s absence, Marinette feels… wrong. Off. A cold pearl inside of her sets and hardens and compresses somewhere deep in her chest, burning bright and incessant like a wailing siren-- a warning. But no matter how often she stops throughout the following days, clasps her hands white-knuckle tight, prays for something, _ anything _ to happen, things carry on as normal. And the irony of it all bites at her, laughs wryly in the back of her mind, a berating little voice-- her own-- cruel and demanding, 

_ Its supposed to be better now. Everything’s supposed to be better now that he’s gone. What’s wrong with you? Why don’t you believe that things are better now, fixed, healed? _

But the weeks and months following the final battle come slow, slower than she could’ve ever imagined, each uneventful day folding into the next, and Marinette becomes acutely aware of the passage of time and it’s torturous, unrelenting passage. 

She can’t _ sleep _ or _ eat _ or _ function_, really. And its not like she could tell anybody about it, aside from Chat Noir, obviously, but God knows _ that _ isn’t an option anymore. So instead Marinette digs her heels into the ground, willing desperately for the earth beneath her to stop spinning and spinning and spinning on it’s axis, just for a second, just so she can _ breathe _ again, but it never relents, and every inhale knocks her lungs against her ribcage. 

One morning during breakfast, roughly twelve days, fourteen hours, and some thirty-odd minutes after the last person had been akumatized in Paris, her father folds up a newspaper and notes how peaceful it is to not read about another attack. Her mother hums in agreement, sipping slowly from her cup of tea. In that moment, Marinette wants to laugh or cry or-- she doesn’t know-- scream. ‘_Something's coming’ _ , she wants so badly to tell them. ‘_Something's coming and it's going to be worse now, now that everyone's off guard’ _ . She _ knows _ this. She does. But instead of laughing or crying or screaming; Marinette bites the inside of her cheek, blinks hard, and pushes her spoon around her cereal bowl, silent.

On the fifteenth night, she digs up the old burner phone Chat Noir had bought her years ago, when things had still been normal between them, when he’d stressed how _ important _ it was for heroes to stay in contact, when he’d flirted with her and waggled his eyebrows during fights just to make her laugh or roll her eyes or both, when he used to call her ‘_Milady _’, when he gave her the phone with it’s haphazardly-decorated case adorned with glittering ladybug stickers, when-- 

Oh, whatever.

She digs up the old thing out from the back of her drawer where it had been shoved somewhere between a hole-y pair of socks and a broker phone charger cord, and falls asleep with it safely tucked underneath her pillow. That night she dreams she’ll awaken to a notification ( **[URGENT] ** ** _SPOTTED: AKUMA ATTACK 22nd Street East End of Paris_ ** ); the night afterward she dreams Chat sends her a simple ‘hello’. Neither ends up being the case when she wakes up, and each morning, she yawns, checks her phone, and then stares aimlessly at the floor, burrowing her toes into her bedroom carpet and feeling as weary as ever. At dawn on a day she feels particularly daring, Marinette sends Chat a short message: _ I can’t sit around anymore. I have to do something. If you’re in, you’re in. If you’re out, so be it. _

He doesn’t respond.

* * *

She knows she’s busy, that she should be spending her time whining about how difficult her classes are, what with this being her final year of high school and the time she should be applying to various fashion institutes around Paris, but Marinette can’t really find it in her to _ care_. 

At lunch they sit, she, Luka, Alya, and Nino, perched at the bottom of the school’s stairway, and she’ll contribute to their conversations as best she can-- hums here and there, a laugh, a giggle-- but neither her heart nor her mind are there. All she can think about is them. Hawkmoth. Chat Noir. It wasn’t until Luka would nudge her shoulder, ask her if she was alright, asked her about the worried knot between her brows or the scowl on her face, that she’d be pulled back into reality. 

The seconds and minutes and hours she’s used to setting aside for her responsibilities as Ladybug are suddenly empty and Marinette feels like the world’s suddenly stopped spinning, leaving her teetering on it’s edge, trying-- _ failing-- _ to find her balance. "I don't know what to do," she confesses to Alya one day during lunch, "I have so much free time that its driving me crazy." 

"Girl," Alya had teased in response, her eyes narrowing, "This is a _ blessing _ ; you should rejoice! Meanwhile I'm swamped with all of these college applications _ and _ babysitting the twins. Luckily, I haven't had to update the Ladyblog in a while, if I did everything would just be too much."

"Yeah," Marinette sagged a little in her seat, swallowing down the bitter lump that had formed in her throat. “Luckily.”

* * *

On the thirtieth day, on a morning that might otherwise be rather unextraordinary, Marinette gets out of bed and decides _Enough is enough. _She can’t just _sit _there. She can’t just sit around and _wait _for something to happen, only to be blindsided anyway. Enough. She transforms into Ladybug for the first time in months and for a moment the costume’s material feels unfamiliar, foreign and uncomfortable, rough against her skin, and she hesitates.

When she finally manages to swallow her anxiety down and dial Chat, the phone rings one, two, three times before a shrill automated message answers, and she winces.

_The number you dialed is not a working number. Please check the number and dial again. El número que ha marcado no es un número de trabajo. Por favor, compruebe el número y vuelva a marcar. Le numéro que vous avez composé n'est pas un numéro valide. S'il vous plaît— _

She didn’t know what she’d been expecting, really-- a cordial welcome, an emotionless greeting, for him to hang up on her-- but whatever it was, it certainly hadn’t been that. That pearl inside her that had been growing and growing drops hard and heavy into the pit of her stomach, and Marinette bites her tongue, tastes bitter metal in her mouth, and detransforms. 

* * *

The nights that Marinette can sleep through in their entirety are few and far between.

Soon she grows tired of waking with a gasping start at the earliest of hours, sweat beading her temple and not a speck of morning light glinting through her curtains, so she’ll chug a coffee or two before bedtime and lie in bed, staring up at the dark shadows as they flit across her ceiling and, though she’ll fight it, her mind will always, eventually settle on that day, the last day, like a broken record, looping and looping until slumber overcomes her not gradually but all at once like a thunderless bolt of lightning. 

She’s gone through their final fight so many times she could tell it in her sleep-- that is, if she ever _ really _ got any. Here’s how it goes:

_ Before the the thing’s even started, its over. _

_ From the first buzzing notification on her phone (a new safety measure Mayor Bourgeois's administration had implemented after five straight weeks of akuma attacks) at which Marinette had leapt up from her seat to excuse herself in the middle of one of Miss Bustier’s lectures, to her race down the school corridor, knocking shoulders with Adrien Agreste on her way out, who-- for reasons unbeknownst to her-- was barreling in the opposite direction, too quick for her to even eek out a startled ‘hello’ to, to her dip out into the alleyway to hastily transform into Ladybug and race through anxiety-inducing crowds, to her rendezvous with Chat Noir at their usual spot some fifty metres from the school, the whole thing was-- as always-- a sensory overload, and couldn't have lasted more than five minutes. And yet, by the time she and Chat had reached the akumatized victim-- a disgruntled street vendor who was terrorizing Parisians in the streets below-- the man suddenly de-transformed before their eyes, just as the heroes leaped into the fray from their position atop a nearby building. _

_ At this, Chat and Ladybug quickly exchanged bewildered glances, before springing over to the victim. The streets-- which had been bustling with frantic crowds just moments before-- were now uncharacteristically still. As they approached the disheveled man something in Marinette wavered, her heart rattling against her ribcage as erratically as it had seconds ago when she'd readied herself for battle. "Monsieur," she’d began, clearing her throat in an attempt to sound more collected, like Ladybug would be, should be. She ignored the heat of Chat's inquiring glance in her periphery, and continued, "What's happened?" _

_ "I--" the man had started, dabbing feverishly at his reddened face with a handkerchief, "I'm not sure." _

_ "Sir," Chat Noir had said calmly from beside her, and Marinette's insides turned, How was he always so sure of himself? Of his surroundings? How did he always know the right thing to say? _

_ Something small and dark, an envious little coal, settled in the pit of her stomach and Marinette swallowed, hard, as Chat soothed the older man. "Sir, you were akumatized. But then you just... recovered. Don’t you remember?" _

_ "No, I don't remember any of that!" the vendor proclaimed, extending his arms before letting them fall, helplessly, at his sides. "I don't remember any of that at all." _

_ Marinette and Chat Noir shared another wary look. Marinette raised her eyebrows as if to say, I believe him, and Chat shot back a small, short nod in return. _

_ "Okay, Monsieur." Marinette interjectected, "that's alright. Thank you for your time and, um, and have a good day." _

_ Once they get out of earshot, Chat Noir reached out and clasped a hand around Marinette's forearm. "Ladybug, what was that? What's going on?" _

_ "I.. I don't know, Chat." Marinette admitted, wriggling out of his grasp. She sat against the wall and drew her knees to her chest, her arms encircling her legs. "This is all so confusing." She pressed the palm of her hand to her forehead and sucked in her breath. A cold breeze whizzed past her ears and she shivered, hating herself a little for that moment of vulnerability. “This is wrong. All of this is wrong. Nothing is making any sense. Why would Hawkmoth--” _

_ "He's done this before." Chat interrupted, tearing Marinette from her whirlwind of thoughts. _

_ "What?" _

_ "Hawkmoth. He's done this before. Don't you remember?" Marinette blinked back at him, saying nothing. Chat Noir released a short breath-- something close to a sigh, Marinette thought-- and pressed his back against the wall opposite her, his arms folded insurgently across his chest. "Two years ago. He did this with Mayor Bourgeois and his wife. He almost got our Miraculouses. He and Master Fu... You really don't remember?" _

_ "I-- Oh!" Marinette flummoxed, lifting her chin from her knees. "Oh. God, yes. Yes, I do. Of course, I--” She snapped her mouth shut, feeling stupid. “Yes, I remember." _

_ Chat pressed his lips together, tight, and Marinnette couldn't tell if he was trying to hide his annoyance or mirth; in the past few months things had been uncomfortably tense between the two of them. She prayed it was the latter and set her jaw defiantly, "Hey, this isn't funny, Chat! I'm... I'm just tired." _

_ "I am too." Chat said and somehow, despite years of working with him, this caught Marinette off guard. _

_ "You are?" _

_ "Of course, Ladybug! I'm here with you, everyday, putting in the same hours as you, everyday, and I have school and even more responsibilities outside of that and--" _

_ "Okay! Okay, I get it. I'm sorry it's just... you always seem so... put together." She hugged her knees closer to her. The air was cold, too cold, and when she sucked in a breath her teeth ache. _

_ Chat laughed wryly. "Well, I'm not. And you should know me better than that, by now." _

_ "Well," _

_ "Well?" _

_ "I-- Nothing. I have to get going, anyway." Marinette relented. Her throat burned as she pushed herself up to stand. Her hands shook as she used her Yo-Yo to grapple to the top of a nearby building. "See you later, Chat. And, I'm... I'm sorry." _

_ "Bye, Ladybug." _

_ As she vaulted away, the image of Chat's eyes, dark green and solemn underneath that domino mask, lingered in her mind. As she leapt from rooftop to rooftop, far from her partner, her blood still pounded in her ears, loud and demanding like the unsteady beat of a drum. _

She doesn’t sleep. 

* * *

“I saw Adrien the other day,” Alya tells her one day as they make their way home from school, and Marinette chokes a little around the bread roll between her teeth, “_ What _?”

None of them-- not even Nino-- had seen Adrien in over a month; he’d stopped coming to school and though no one knew for sure, rumor had it that Mr. Agreste had fallen ill. 

“I--Where? When? How--” Marinette splutters out after the worst of her coughing subsides, and she feels her ears and cheeks burn red in embarrasment. 

“Slow down, girl!” Alya laughs, a little incredulously, and Marinette would feel more ashamed about her reaction-- she and Luka were… _ something _after all; they had been talking for months-- but she hadn’t seen Adrien since the morning of the final fight. 

“At the grocery store.” Marinette opens her mouth to ask for more details but Alya lifts a hand to silence her, continuing, “he was with Nathalie, I didn’t see Mr. Agreste with him, if that’s what you were gonna ask. We didn’t get to talk much, they were kind of in a hurry, but he told me to say hello.”

“I-- to me?” 

“Well, to everyone, really.” 

“Oh.” Marinette swallows, tugging at her ponytail.

“Yeah.”

“Well… I hope he’s doing well.”

"Yeah, me too."

"Yeah," Marinette echoes softly.

* * *

  
On the fiftieth day, Marinette takes the old burner phone and smashes it against the pavement until it lies empty and broken on the sidewalk, surrounded by a halo of shattered glass. The shards leave small, red indents in the palms of her hands when she gathers them all to dispose safely in the garbage, and Marinette pulls thorns around herself and thinks nothing, feels nothing of it, and transforms into Ladybug.

* * *

She starts patrolling Paris as Ladybug again, sometimes at night but oftentimes during school, slipping out at lunch or between classes, and at first its exhilarating, like how being Ladybug was at the beginning, years ago, something new and daring-- an escape. She'll perch atop a tall skyscraper and look out, down, to the streets below and the people walking and talking and laughing and she'll fight it, the heaviness in her chest that's yearning to feel that same joy, and the pearl will harden once more. She'll grow content. Slowly, she will. And it's close to happiness-- contentment is, isn't it? That's enough for her. Enough for now, she thinks.

She starts to sleep more. Eats better. Luka asks her out to the movies (_'Finally!'_ Alya had proclaimed when Marinette told her,_ 'Finally!'_) and its nice, if not a little awkward at first. There are no akumas to catch nor akumatized villains to stop, but petty crime is always thriving in Paris. She captures a bank robber one day, a pick-pocket the next. As Ladybug, she brings rolls of bread from her parents' bakery to a homeless shelter, and their gratitude is thanks enough.

But one night on patrol, she hears it as she's swinging from one building to another. Clear and urgent, the voice somehow hundreds of miles away and right beside her, she can almost touch it, feel it against her skin, she _knows_ it. 

"--_Ladybug_\--"

Its Hawkmoth.

Marinette falters and the yo-yo's grapple snaps and the world lurches, slows, for a single pulsing moment as she falls. 

Her palms and knees and skin slam into solid ground and it feels the same as it did when she fell off her bike when she was five, only her Mom isn't there to smooth her hair back and kiss her cheeks and tell her everything's going to be alright, and when Marinette sucks in a breath it sounds like a sob. She whirls around only to find nothing behind her, but she knows it, she know's it's real, and her palms grow clammy and her throat sore as the autumn wind slaps, cold and dry, against her face.

She runs. Bolts in the opposite direction, arms and legs and lungs screaming and burning and aching as she makes her way home. She races up the staircase upstairs to her room before her parents, perplexed behind the bakery's counter, can ask her what's wrong or why she isn't in class.

She lies in bed that night, shivering beneath her duvet as the open window lets in October breeze and the police car sirens are a lullaby until sleep, finally, thankfully, overcomes her.

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me on Twitter! I'm planning on maybe making social media AU's there on my fic writing account ([@riverballad](http://twitter.com/riverballad)), and my [Tumblr](riverballad.tumblr.com)


End file.
